The other thing to keep in mind is the effect it has on your readers. I believe we should do everything we can to minimize the number of mouseclicks a reader needs to execute on our sites.

For example, one reason I went to a 3-column format was to minimize the amount of scrolling readers need to do to see what's in the sidebars. I also try very hard to ensure if a reader clicks a link on my site, it opens a new tab or window, rather then replace the current window.

LOL...the other thing I try to do is not go off on a tangent, but to stay on topic--at which I failed miserably here.

Okay, back to the point: By having the main article somewhere other than where the reader starts reading, gives them the choice NOT to click your "Read the rest of the article here" link.

I think that a "Read More" can be good for some articles on some blogs. For instance, I recently completed a lengthy article that compares the trinkets available to Restoration Druids that ended up being several screens in length. About half that information was the math behind the comparisons, and that could likely have been easily moved after a "Read More" link. It's also appropriate on a syndicate site with content that varies a lot, giving readers a taste of an article's contents to allow for the display of more articles. I do think that it can be taken overboard, however, as it was on my old Blogger blog. Just about every article included a "Read More" link and, looking back, about 95% of them were probably unnecessary.

If you do decide to go this route but want to continue delivering the full contents of your article to RSS subscribers, I recommend an addon like Full Text Feed.

Kestrel wrote:

I also try very hard to ensure if a reader clicks a link on my site, it opens a new tab or window, rather then replace the current window.

You know, I used to work very hard to do this, too. Then I read this post by Lorelle where she basically admonishes me (and other authors) for trying to dictate the way my readers browse. I cringed when I read that then dutifully used a Find and Replace widget to remove all the target="_blank" from all my external links.

Phae, I tried Full Text Feed. Five minutes after activating it, Karthis gave me a hard time because my feed now had a "Read more..." link. I've been leery of trying it again.

And oh my...here I've been trying to make things easier because I have a problem closing windows when I'm redirected to them, because I don't have the "Back" button ingrained in me. But what an excellent point!

I absolutely agree with the open in new windows thing. If I WANT to open in a new window, I know how to. Chances are, if I click a link on someone's site, I'm ready to leave their site. I don't appreciate what kind of feels like (though I know in many cases, it's well intentioned) high-handedness, keeping me on a site I obviously just intended to leave.

And just on that note, with regards to what Lorelle said as well, something else that bugs me is the item pop up thingies. I don't know if they're all on mouseover, or you have to click some of them or what. And I know they're a cute nifty trick and all, and really helpful. Do they work just on mouseover, or do you have to click? 'Cause I hate having things I didn't ask for popping up in front of me. To me, the WoW Item links, while admittedly much more useful, are barely a step above snap previews in terms of annoyance factor, but that could also be because some people don't quite use them sparingly enough.

I guess I'm willing to see the good side of the WoW Item links, but don't go overboard, no one wants little boxes popping up in front of them with no safe real estate to move their mouse to while they're reading.

I can see your point about WoW item links. However, to most readers of WoW Blogs, they're an asset. It's much more convenient to see an item's stats in a popup tooltip display than to have to go to WoWhead to search for it. I think as long as they're implemented in such a way that it's CLEAR what it is (i.e., it's color-coded and includes the "[" "]" brackets we're all familiar with from playing), that they shouldn't be too obtrusive.

So true. Believe it or not, I recently went back through my trinkets article and removed several tooltips I thought might be superfluous. Basically, if I didn't think someone might wonder "what's this?" I didn't keep it. But for things like a reference guide (the final table of trinket comparisons), I figured someone might skip directly there and repeated their links just in case.

Regarding the whole opening new windows on links thing and everyone's apparent hatred for it (not me, mind you. I do it all the time in my blog and don't intend to change. The non-conformist in me shines.), does anyone else find it ironic that every link from this site opens up a new browser window? I'm just sayin'.

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